Spain firefighters battle Canary Islands wildfire

Firefighters made progress Wednesday against a wildfire on Spain's Canary Island of La Gomera that ravaged part of a rare nature reserve and forced out thousands of people, officials said. "The drop in temperatures and the change in wind direction has caused the fire to advance slowly and as a result the work to extinguish it has had better results," Canaries emergency services spokeswoman Carmina Lorenzo said. Four water-bombing planes and three helicopters were battling the blaze on the Atlantic island, she added. The wildfire first broke out more than a week ago and spread rapidly across the parched land due to sweltering temperatures and wind, forcing 5,000 people to be evacuated because of the threat from the encroaching flames and smoke. The majority were allowed to return home on Tuesday but there were still 1,360 evacuees waiting for the green light to go home, Lorenzo said. The fire has ravaged more than 4,000 hectares (10,000 acres) of land, including hundreds in the Garajonay National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site that is home to rare subtropical plants. "The front of the fire has not advanced significantly," regional security minister Javier Gonzalez Ortiz told a news conference. Firefighters were battling another blaze which broke out in the early hours of Wednesday in the neighbouring island of Tenerife in a ravine between the towns of La Orotava and Los Realejos, he added. Two helicopters that had been battling the wildfire on La Gomera were sent on Wednesday to Tenerife to help tackle the blaze there, said Gonzalez Ortiz. It was too soon to say how big the Tenerife wildfire is, he added. Spain is at particularly high risk of fires this summer after suffering its driest winter in 70 years. Two firefighters were killed while fighting a blaze in pine forests near Alicante in southeastern Spain on Sunday, authorities said. Last month four people died in a wildfire in the northern Catalonia region. The Spanish government said a total of 132,300 hectares of land had been burnt this year up to August 5.